Personal life Pere-Enric de Ferran i de Rocabruna (Spanish
: Pedro-Enrique, French
: Pierre-Henri) was born in Barcelona on June 2, 1865 into a wealthy, influential family with noble roots. His paternal grandfather was Andrés de Ferran y Dumont, a lawyer, founder of the Institut Agrícola Català de Sant Isidre. His father, Ignacio Maria de Ferran y de Ribes was also doctor of law, as well as professor of law and political economy. His mother, Petra de Rocabruna y Jordà, was the daughter of the Baron of Albi. When Pere-Enric was five years old, his mother Petra died, and when he was fifteen, his father Ignacio died, leaving Pere-Enric under the tutelage of his grandfather Andrés, who had a great influence on Pere-Enric, particularly in directing and boosting his education. As a child he already showed interest and admiration for music, becoming a hobby that the family repressed, considering that music was an inappropriate dedication for the social position they held. The grandfather-guardian insisted that Pere-Enric study law and become a lawyer like his father and grandfather had been. Thus, Pere-Enric followed family plans and pursued a law degree, restraining and postponing his musical vocation. By the end of the 19th century he married Francesca Finet i Pansas, who died shortly after and with whom he had no children. In 1901 he married Camila Sardà i Ballester, from a family from
Reus, with whom he had six children. In his private and family life, Pere-Enric de Ferran adopted options considered avant-garde or extravagant for the time, such as following a vegetarian diet, or having his children sunbathe naked on the rooftop of their house. He lived in Barcelona,
Brussels, Reus and
Madrid, and died in Brussels in 1919.
Musical career in Barcelona When he was 30 years old he abandoned the legal profession (it seems that he never practiced), and passionately devoted himself to studying music under the mastery of and
Enric Morera. In 1903 the lyrical work
Las Bodas de Camacho premiered at the Tivoli theater in Barcelona, with music by Pere-Enric de Ferran and libretto by
Jacint Grau and
Adrià Gual, based on an episode of
Don Quixote. The reviews in the press highlight very favorably the quality and workmanship of the music, particularly spotlighting the prelude. Between 1902 and 1910, Pere-Enric de Ferran set music to several lyrical plays, some of them framed in the Teatre Líric Català by
Enric Morera, such as
La Núvia, lyrics by
Adrià Gual, and ''L' Eterna Lluita
, lyrics by Enric de Fuentes. Furthermore, in 1909 he premiered at the Apolo theater in Barcelona the work La Canción de la Ninfa'', with lyrics by Emilio Roig (pseudonym of
Baldomer Gili i Roig). He also composed choral pieces and songs for voice and piano. In all these pieces we find texts by relevant authors of the time, such as
Apel·les Mestres,
Modest Urgell,
Jacint Grau, Emili Guanyavents, Jaume Massó, Enric de Fuentes,
Paul Bourget and notably, the author and theater entrepreneur
Adrià Gual, with whom Pere-Enric collaborated many times and had a friendship. He also began a collaboration with the poet Maurice Boné de Villiers, with a libretto from which he began the composition of the opera
Les amantes de Palerme. Simultaneously, while he was in Brussels he served as correspondent in Belgium for the Barcelona newspaper
La Vanguardia.
Back to Spain At the beginning of August 1914, the
first world war broke out, the German army entered Belgium and marched towards Brussels. Pere-Enric de Ferran decided to hastily flee with his family back to Spain, before the communication routes were cut off, taking with him the maximum of musical work that he could transport. He composed some solo piano pieces, such as
Abril, dedicated to
Andrés Segovia, he began the composition of the operetta
Barnum with a libretto by Marc-Jesús Bertran Tintorer, started collaborations with
Enrique García Álvarez and
Alfonso Hernández-Catá for some operettas, he worked on a symphonic poem based on the poem
Le Sylphe by
Victor Hugo, and continued developing the opera
Les amantes de Palerme that he had started in Belgium. He did not get to know his youngest daughter Genoveva, who was born just 8 days after the death of his father.
Legacy He left unfinished the opera
Les Amantes de Palerme, libretto by Maurice Boné de Villiers, the operetta
Barnum, libretto by Marc-Jesús Bertran Tintore and the symphonic poem
Le Sylphe on a poem by
Victor Hugo. The fact that he had died outside of Spain, where he was beginning to be recognized and appreciated, and his widow decided to stay in Belgium, when the country was still recovering from the ravages of the war, caused the work of Pere-Enric de Ferran to stop being programmed and promoted. The composer's personal archive, containing most of the scores of his works, was kept for more than 70 years, first by his widow and later by his daughters; in 2005 the archive was transferred to the
Library of Catalonia, where it is inventoried and catalogued. == Works ==